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Among the many reasons why religious people have joined congregations through the ages, three stand out: believing, behaving and belonging. Different traditions have different orders of priorities. Christians, it seems, would put believing first; they belong in order to be confirmed in their faith. Jews and perhaps Muslims, on the other hand, give priority to behaving, assuming that actions lead to convictions.

Today neither belief nor behaviour seems to be the main reason for membership of a religious community. Particularly the young often say that their beliefs need not be informed by official doctrine and that their behaviour reflects their personal convictions and isn’t to be governed by social conformity or archaic rules.

That’s why in our time belonging, more than believing and behaving, motivates membership. Autonomy may make for believing and behaving, but it doesn’t alleviate loneliness; it may even heighten it. Therefore, even if their beliefs are shaky and their behaviour inconsistent, people may still want to belong to a religious community. The way beliefs and behaviour are articulated is secondary to the need to be recognized and appreciated.

Traditionally, clergy would tell their flock what to believe and how to behave. Today, however, even those who are particular about traditional faith and observance choose to profess them voluntarily. They need their religious leaders for other reasons.

Liberal Judaism, in which I’ve been reared, has in the past been less concerned with behaviour than with belief, not as a concession to Christianity but because the open society in which we live exposes us not only to different faiths but also to the isms that deny the validity of religion. To acquire the tools that make for conviction became, therefore, an important way of strengthening commitment to Judaism and refuting those who challenge it.

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But the need to belong that stems from loneliness and anomie is still taking precedence. Most of us live in cities where it’s usually much more difficult to connect to a group or a cause. Religious congregations, with their routine of meetings and celebrations, provide opportunities to alleviate the sense of being lost in the world.

Modern rabbis, like clergy in other religions, are expected to respond to the new reality and meet the needs of the members of the congregations they serve. They still point to the norms of behaviour, albeit often less the ritual and more the ethical, and they still articulate the tenets of the faith as points for consideration rather than dogma, but the main task of contemporary clergy is to make people feel good about themselves.

I had reason to reflect on this recently at two services of installation of rabbis. Last September, Rabbi Yael Splansky was officially welcomed as the senior rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, which I had the privilege to serve for 17 years and with which I remain connected. Last Saturday, I helped to install Rabbi Sharon Sobel as the spiritual leader of Temple Isaiah in Stony Brook, New York. Both began their careers as assistants at Holy Blossom.

What distinguishes them from their predecessors isn’t only that they’re women — two among many who’ve helped to revitalize contemporary Judaism — but that they also have the gift of making people feel appreciated. They don’t tell them what to believe and they don’t make overt demands on their behaviour. They motivate them to believe and behave by giving them a strong sense of belonging.

Theology and observance haven’t been removed from the Jewish religious agenda, but sociology and psychology have been added to it. The young rabbis know it well and members of the congregations they serve are grateful beneficiaries.

Dow Marmur is rabbi emeritus at Toronto's Holy Blossom Temple. His column appears every other week.

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